Local knowledge: an Akuapem Twi history of Asante

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Periodical article

Title:	Local knowledge: an Akuapem Twi history of Asante
Author:	McCaskie, Tom C.
Year:	2011
Periodical:	History in Africa (ISSN 1558-2744)
Volume:	38
Pages:	169-192
Language:	English
Geographic term:	Ghana
Subjects:	local history historiography Ashanti polity Twi language Akwapim polity biographies (form)
About person:	Rev. N.V. Asare (1849-)
External link:	http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/history_in_africa/v038/38.1.mccaskie.pdf
Abstract:	This paper introduces and contextualizes a historical source on Ghana's Asante past in Akan Twi. It was researched in Asante between 1902 and 1910 and finished in written form in Akan Twi in 1915. The author of this 'Asante Abasem. Twi Kasamu: History of Ashanti in Tshi' (AA) was Rev. N.V. Asare, born in 1849 in Akuapem, and educated by teachers of the Basel Mission Society (BM). Asare was an intelligent man, a native Twi-speaker with a serious interest in history, and also adept with languages. The present paper examines Asare's research methodology and his way of writing history, noting that he had absorbed the lessons of the BM's Akuapem oral research tradition in full. Christian moralizing takes second place to explicating history and culture in Asare's text. In conclusion, the paper briefly summarizes the AA's 33 chapters. Bibliogr., notes, ref. [ASC Leiden abstract]